It’s been six years since we’ve seen snow
in our neck of the woods and I was beginning
to fear the end of snow forever and ever,
another casualty of the warming planet.
But lo and behold, it snows
and snows and snows and snows.
The cars are buried, the driveway become
invisible, the branches of trees heavy,
threatening us with their sway,
the flower pots overflowing, the boy
ecstatic, saying, yesterday, mouth full
of ice cold powder, “this is like the beach,
only a million times better.” And he tries
to make a snowman, which turns out
more like a big mound, and then pointy like some
kind of obscene ice phallus, the snow too dry
to roll into a ball. Everyone’s posting
the obligatory snow accumulation photos
and I write this obligatory snow poem.
I don’t want it to stop and simultaneously
want it to end, the inconvenience of it,
and the bone chill. But mostly I could go on
and on like this, snow days, providing
as they do lots and lots of time.
I can write a poem, make music if I like,
read a book, play with the family,
and at night, mostly, sit in front
of fires and drink in the kind of silence
that only comes with a big snow.
michael jarmer 